Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard
A couple of Time Warner shareholders went after CNN CEO Jeff Bewkes Thursday in LA at a Time Warner shareholders meeting [...] David Almasi, the Veep of the National Center for Public Policy Research1, a conservative communications and research foundation, is in LA to question Bewkes. Both Almasi and President David Ridenour are Time Warner shareholders.
[...] “Mr. Bewkes, we have urged you many times to make CNN more objective,” Almasi said in his statement. “You have admitted to us in 2014 the need for more balance. We praised you last year after CNN President Jeffrey Zucker also acknowledged this and acted on the need for more diverse views. But bias is apparently worse than ever. As shareholders, we are concerned about the repetitional risk to our investment in Time Warner as CNN appears to be a key player in the war against the Trump presidency.”
Almasi cited a Media Research Center2 study of CNN programing for 14 hours and 27 minutes of news coverage back on May 12. The report concluded that all but 68 minutes were devoted to Trump with 96 guests out of 123 being negative.
[...] “I’m inquiring about CNN’s bias and our return on investment,” Almasi continued in his statement. “Half of the American public – which includes potential and current CNN viewers – voted for Trump last November and supports his agenda. CNN acts as if it is part of the anti-Trump resistance. Are you willing to lose viewers, possibly forever, because of the bias?”
Almasi even threatened Bewkes, saying that Media Research Center plans to alert advertisers about news programs that “peddle smear, hate and political extremism.”
He asked Bewkes, “Are you concerned about advertisers leaving CNN? Will you continue to ignore our appeals for objectivity at the risk to our investment in Time Warner?”
Source: The Daily Caller
1The National Center for Public Policy Research, founded in 1982, is a self-described conservative think tank in the United States. In February 2014, at Apple Inc.'s annual shareholder meeting, NCPPR proposed Apple "disclose the costs of its sustainability programs" was rejected by 97% vote. The NCPPR representative argued that Apple's decision to have all of its power come from greens sources would lower shareholders' profits.
2The Media Research Center (MRC) is a politically conservative content analysis organization based in Reston, Virginia, founded in 1987 by activist L. Brent Bozell III. Its stated mission is to "prove—through sound scientific research—that liberal bias in the media does exist and undermines traditional American values."
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In order to determine the effectiveness of the environmentally-friendly remodel and learn whether the self-appointed spokesman of the environmental movement has amended his energy-devouring ways, the National Center for Public Policy Research obtained Gore's electricity usage information through public records requests and conversations with the Nashville Electric Service (NES).
In powering his home, Gore still greatly outpaces most Americans in energy consumption. The findings were shocking:
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @02:13PM (88 children)
It's about time that news media went back to factual reporting and news gathering, rather than slinging innuendo against Trump.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Arik on Tuesday June 20 2017, @02:24PM (64 children)
When was that? The majority of it's always been crap.
And I don't expect that CNN or any other big media companies are going to reverse course on this. Certainly not right now, they expect to win this.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Oakenshield on Tuesday June 20 2017, @02:48PM (5 children)
I believe the correct term is "jumped the shark."
I was appalled the last time I watched CNN and that was well before the last election cycle. There was no "news" at all, only opinion and talking heads. They even changed Headline News (which used to be called CNN when CNN was new) to the point it was unrecognizable and renamed it HLN. There were no facts reported, and nothing you would ever call headlines. I realized I had not been missing anything and went back to NPR for news while it still lasts.
What is the point of having a news channel when no news is reported?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Arik on Tuesday June 20 2017, @02:57PM (4 children)
We used to call it disinformation, but in todays newspeak I believe it's called 'controlling the narrative.'
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:48PM (3 children)
I think it's called tabloid or ratings whore. When it started being about profit, ratings, it stopped being news. This is the case with any "24 hour news" channel and has been for ~20 years at least.
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Tuesday June 20 2017, @06:45PM (2 children)
Nope, it ain't even about ratings in any sort of general sense. The Legacy Media business model is to lose money, something they do wonderfully. Seriously, NBC News is not a profit center and NBC has always considered it a "public service" to operate it at a loss. Same for CBS News, ABC News, Time Warner News (aka CNN), The Washington Post (aka Jeff Bezos's Blog / Lobbying firm), The NYT, etc. They consider making profits to be dirty, seeing as they are all communists this makes perfect sense. FNC was the exception, driving the lion's share of profits for News Corp but the Murdoch kids have announced their plan to 'correct' this defect and make it more like CNN, i.e. a money pit operated for prestige and influence for the rest of the media empire.
It is about influence, and influence among the 'right' people at that. Morning Joe's ratings usually can't be found on national charts but in the Acela Corridor all the 'right' people do tune in so his show is considered highly influential and a 'hit.' Bill Oreilly and now Tucker Carlson can dominate their prime time time slot across all of cable, not just cable news but their demos are all wrong and are thus failures and not at all important. It ain't about ratings. And as everything becomes political pure ratings (as in number of sets or eyeballs) aren't as important in entertainment, it is about the 'right' viewers, whether a show is delivering an 'important' message, etc.
To the public naming and shaming outfits like MRC do is helpful, in that the more the public realizes the legacy media is a lie the better, their stated goal is insane. They are demanding CNN act like a profit centered capitalist corporation when they have never even hinted they want to be such a thing. And they never will. They may lose so much ratings that cable systems buck the bundle and drop them or relegate them to tiered hell but they will happily go down with all banners flying the hammer and sickle sure in the knowledge they will all have jobs waiting at MSNBC if they do. Then Fox, etc. until the last legacy TV network fails.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @08:59PM
Would you like some milk with those Nut-O-s?
CNN was not profit motivated when owned by Ted Turner, it has since changed course into a profit machine and has gone downhill as a news agency.
Of COURSE you leave Fox News as the only bastion of hope... woweee you need a breakfast alternative. Maybe something with more fiber to work the bullshit out of your system.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Tuesday June 20 2017, @10:52PM
Actually, the reason the TV networks used to be like that back in the day was that in order to get FCC licenses the government required them to provide news coverage as a public service. There has never been a lot of money in straight reporting, so NBC, CNN, and ABC all basically accepted having a news department as a cost of doing business (PBS, of course, has never been a profitable organization, because that's not its role as a non-profit).
What has been determined by lots of news outlets is that while fact-based reporting is not profitable, pure opinion that the viewer happens to agree with can be. Fox News runs on this to make money from conservative folks. So does MSNBC, to make money from liberal folks. So does CNN, pretending to be the "moderate" option to make money from people who don't actually have a political philosophy. Not one of them is truly informing anybody of anything.
In more recent years, this has extended to web "reporting" as well.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday June 20 2017, @02:59PM (20 children)
I thought the news was honest, fair, and balanced well into my teen years. The first time I witnessed some news, then saw that outrageous reporting, it finally dawned on me that maybe more of the news was bullshit.
I suspect that a lot of people grow up believing the news. It's probably easy for a lot of people to point to their youth, and claim that the reporting at that time was factual.
It's all in a person's background and perception.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by VLM on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:18PM (2 children)
If you're really old you had Pravda as an example of extreme leftist propaganda. Now we have CNN to point to, at least as devout as Pravda ever was.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @11:14PM (1 child)
If you are really really old you had Goebbels.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:31AM
My grandparents say he was way more subtle.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by KGIII on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:24PM (14 children)
Let's also be fair and say that not all sides deserve equal time or need to be reported. To take it to the extreme, if Trump eats a baby on national television, we probably don't need to give a voice to those who would find a way to spin it as a good thing. Probably...
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:17PM (1 child)
So, babies aren't good?
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Tuesday June 20 2017, @11:10PM
They're mushy.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:19PM (11 children)
Wrong, for true freedom we need the Fairness Doctrine back http://fair.org/extra/the-fairness-doctrine/ [fair.org]
Using an extremely hypothetical situation to argue against is disingenuous.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by NewNic on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:11PM (10 children)
I don't think that fairness is the answer.
I think that the answer lies in the question of how Fox News is able to claim to be "fair and balanced".
Fake balance, fake fairness is the real problem. If you want to put over a partisan viewpoint, that's OK, but you have to be overt about your viewpoint. Don't claim that it is fair.
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 3, Insightful) by BK on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:20PM (6 children)
As bad as FoxNews is and can be... compared to CNN in the last 2-3 years, Fox is 'Fair and Balanced'. Sometimes we make our own destiny?
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:26PM
You've eaten too much of the dog food, Fox news is at least as bad as CNN in the other direction, pretending otherwise is ridiculous.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by urza9814 on Tuesday June 20 2017, @06:13PM (3 children)
There's a difference between balance and objectivity. Balance is when you give an hour of airtime to a math professor, then give an hour of airtime to a group trying to claim the value of Pi is exactly 3. Objectivity is when you only give the second group five minutes, during which you rightly point out that they're all idiots.
You can be "fair" or "balanced" without being honest. In fact, trying to present all sides equally generally makes it nearly impossible to actually be honest -- because you have to pretend any idiot has a valid point.
News organizations should try to report the facts, not the debate. Anything else just isn't the news.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:34AM (2 children)
This is +5 insightful?
Wow, people have really fallen for the propaganda that the world is populated by morons, except for you of course, you're SPECIAL.
The news was much better under the fairness doctrine, you can wish for 100% objectivity, purely fact based reporting, but that is naive in the extreme. Most news is closely tied to human opinion, and the fairness doctrine did not ensure that every wacko was able to spout off on TV. Your example is terrible, and actually in this "modern age" of information we had Bill Nye try and debate creationists which went very badly. We've got all sorts of bullshit pushed now as part of an agenda, but with the fairness doctrine no outlet would be able to be 100% partisan like they are now.
Take your naive superiority complex and shove it.
(Score: 1, Redundant) by cubancigar11 on Wednesday June 21 2017, @05:27AM
Its really hard to gauge the seriousness of your argument when you post as AC.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Wednesday June 21 2017, @12:16PM
My example was "terrible" probably because I didn't make something up but instead used something once taken as a serious proposal by politicians. In fact, it was passed *unanimously* by a state assembly. Look up "The Indiana Pi Bill" if you're curious.
As for the fairness doctrine...yes, it's a good bill, and wouldn't contradict what I posted in any way. The fairness doctrine didn't actually say that they had to be "fair" or "balanced", it basically just said that they have to mention that the opposing viewpoint exists. So presenting the other side and rightly calling them idiots would still be acceptable under the fairness doctrine. It said you must present the opposing view, it did not say you have to give it equal airtime, nor did it say you have to present it as a good idea.
I think the fairness doctrine is more about free speech than anything else. The FCC was limiting peoples' right to speak on the public airwaves by licensing monopolies to specific companies, so they passed a rule that those companies had to occasionally allow opposing viewpoints to use their frequency allocation as well. Which is less important now that TV is far less influential than the Internet.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @09:03PM
Rewriting the narrative is a lot harder when the truth is so blatantly obvious. Fox has been a cancer on news reporting for decades now. CNN has turned to massive shit, but they're still in the minor league.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Tuesday June 20 2017, @06:46PM (2 children)
Fox News no longer claims [nytimes.com] to be "fair and balanced".
(Score: 2) by NewNic on Tuesday June 20 2017, @07:53PM (1 child)
Maybe Fox doesn't make that claim now, but it is able to do so, which was my original point.
Try reading next time.
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @10:43PM
Fox isn't news so it doesn't matter whether it's balanced or not because it's not news and was ruled to not be news by a court.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:31PM (1 child)
TRUMPS WEALTHY FRIENDS MUST BE TRYING TO HELP HIM... HALF the country votes. So that is only 25% of the audience at most... and trump lost some of them already.
Not that CNN has much quality news... but the main reason so much negative Trump talk is out there is because that man is an idiot! He is unwittingly fueling all this stuff. He whines like a baby while tweeting some of the most provocative BS that the media types can not refrain from.
At MINIMUM news should roast contradictions and lies. We have record amounts of total BS and most of it is easily provable too, so a fair competent media would have to spend massive amounts of time shoveling that shit.
CNN is a ratings whore and their CEO thinks politics is a sport (entertainment) which is why it is so bad. If the top quarterback kept handing the ball to the other team as often... ESPN would dedicate a new channel to it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @06:42PM
> He is unwittingly fueling all this stuff. He whines like a baby while tweeting some of the most provocative BS that the media types can not refrain from.
I would say he very wittingly is making noise and sucking air out of the room while in the background the slashing and burning of regulations, ethics, healthcare, tax reform whistle through with barely a comment. In 4 year's time, all you'll remember is the brand of Ivanka's shoes and Trump's hair style but you'll be in a vastly different country... probably with 1/2 the people in poverty and hopeless.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:27PM (1 child)
Define "win".
http://all-len-all.com/cutbacks-at-cnn-highlight-the-cable-news-paradox/ [all-len-all.com]
The graphs are fascinating, TV is in a permanent long term viewership decline, and soon there will be no point in putting channels in lineups anymore, there's going to be more people watching the public access channels, for example.
Meanwhile revenues keep increasing with inflation. How exactly do you get a billion bucks in ad revenue by showing half a million people propaganda? $2K per person? Seriously? Can anyone say "bubble"? In another form of media, do you think its realistic that SN could achieve over $12M/yr in ad revenue? That sounds ridiculous.
20 times as many people visit their websites (well, aside from click fraud) as watch their shows, which is also weird. TV news is not "TV" anymore for about 98% of their audience.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:44AM
Win: basically anything VLM doesn't like.
not being facetious here :P
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:03PM (32 children)
It seems to have had its ups and downs, rather than a steady state of suck. Many laud the era of Walter Cronkite. Many have fond memories of the NPR of old. Others trusted the MacNeil/Lehrer Report. Prior to those, there was such a thing as yellow journalism.
CNN and the rest of the media, the rest of the Establishment, really, are not going to reverse course because they do expect to win this. It would be quite a Pyrrhic victory, though, because if they succeed in reversing the will of the voters they will lose the country.
Shredding the Presidency the way they are is shredding one of the last institutions holding the country together. Nobody trusts the NSA and will never follow their orders, so when its former commander attacks the Whitehouse he and they are tearing down the one institution that has been shielding them. When the media and Congress push the narrative that Russia controls the Executive Branch, then aren't they also raising the specter that Russia controls Congress and the media too? Maybe the whole thing is a Putin psyop and they're all in on it.
So in de-legitimizing the President, they are also de-legitimizing the entire rest of DC and Wall Street and the entire national power structure.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:25PM
Well with any luck that Pyrrhic victory will lead us forward to a non-violent revolution. However, a new gov born from chaos is rarely a solid one. The good people are undermined by the opportunists because almost by definition the good people don't plan for such scenarios.
Decent person: "Let's work together and solve these problems!"
Evil shitbag: "Sounds great! How can I help?? psssst: did you know that decent person is actually a convicted rapist but they expunged his records? Also, his plans sorta work, but you should support me when I tear down his ideas and put forth popular bullshit just to get myself into power. Woops, wasn't supposed to say that out loud!"
(Score: 3, Insightful) by captain normal on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:30PM (16 children)
"...reversing the will of the voters..."
'... Clinton won 65.8 million votes (48.25%) to almost 63 million (46.15%) for Trump...' Pew Research. http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/12/20/why-electoral-college-landslides-are-easier-to-win-than-popular-vote-ones/ [pewresearch.org]
Maybe you just mean the will of the Electoral College?
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts"- --Daniel Patrick Moynihan--
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:37PM
So cut those numbers in HALF. Trump doesn't even have all the 23% who voted for him; he's lost support from some people who voted for him... possibly losing more than any president. but we won't see him bragging about that one... mostly because it's true (he'd have to exaggerate it too.)
These investors are trump supporters or partners or friends of trump. I'd wonder about their competence when they are supposed to be smart investors but do not realize that they are fundamentally wrong with their argument. On top of that, networks don't appeal to everybody-- they mostly aim for target demographics and the Fox News demo are all near the edge of death... which is not a key demographic (except for voting... Fox is propaganda, they could run at a loss and keep going. CNN is for profit... they want 18-35.)
(Score: 5, Informative) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:55PM (11 children)
The Electoral College is the system that America uses, and it's the system under which Trump won, and which Americans understand is the way to be elected President. If Americans decide that system needs to change, great, but you can't throw out the results of the election conducted under that system because you don't like its outcome without paying a very much greater price than that of suffering a winner you don't like.
It is also very important for everyone who's so upset about Trump right now to understand that he is an expression of the inchoate rage echoing around the United States these days, not the cause of it. Setting him up as the be-all, end-all of dysfunction in America that will be magically resolved upon getting rid of him completely misses the larger dynamic and will backfire spectacularly. If anyone was chastened last week by the Bernie supporter opening fire on Congressional Republicans, then they are really in for a sight should they get their wish and hunt Trump from office.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @06:13PM (1 child)
Nice, discarding a relevant data point (that has no direct consequence to an election result, but sure as hell points to the existence (or complete lack) of a mandate), putting up a strawman to stand in for the zero people I've heard claiming that Trump shouldn't be president because he lost the popular vote, a condescending explanation of "how trump got elected", *and* a backhanded threat of violence towards liberals.
Thank you for a valuable contribution to the discussion.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:24PM
Don't get cute. Citing the "relevant" data point of "Trump lost the popular vote" is precisely done to convey the subtext that 'he really lost,' when he didn't under the actual system that America uses. That's why he's sitting in the Oval Office now, not Hillary. It's the same game the Tea Party guys were playing with Obama's birth certificate, "See! He's not really an American so he can't really be the President!!!"
And my backhanded threat of violence was not toward liberals (it wasn't backhanded or a threat, but a prediction). It was meant to point out that if all the mean talk about Trump in the media could inspire the Bernie supporter to open fire on Republicans, and the mean talk about liberals could have inspired the guy to shoot Gabby Giffords before him, then what does everyone suppose will happen if Trump is actually chased from office because the Establishment plumb doesn't like him?
Thank you for your valuable contribution to the discussion, AC.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @07:07PM (1 child)
True, but I think it is also important to point out that even Mr Trump is subject to the laws of the land. If he broke any of those laws then he is just as much subject to sanction as anyone else. In particular, you and all the other Trumpettes can't just summarily wave off investigations because it is your boy in the White House that is under scrutiny.
What you are saying, in so many words, is that The People threw a collective temper tantrum. Sorry, but this does not lend any confidence in the results of the election.
You just don't get it, do you? If Trump ends up getting "hunted" from office, it will be because most of his supporters, as fickle and filled with "inchoate rage" as they are, have abandoned him. At that point, Republicans in Congress will feel free to cut him loose. Frankly, I won't be sorry to see him go. I just want it done legally by the book.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:42PM
OK, Team Blue. Now you want to stand on the law? Where were you when Obama was applauding the NSA's police state surveillance system? How about when Eric Clapper brazenly lied to Congress about its existence and faced no consequences? Either you uphold the law at all times, even when it's Team Blue in the hotseat, or you don't. But if you don't, then, you don't get to suddenly get religion and demand all of those on Team Red do, too.
FWIW, I'm not on Team Red or on Team Blue, but on Team Red, White, & Blue.
Yes, I am saying that. No, you should not have confidence in the results of the election because there was none to be had no matter how it played out. A criminal, or a molotov cocktail. What a choice. But better a molotov cocktail than yet another criminal cut from the same cloth as all the others. At least with a molotov cocktail something unexpected might happen, and there's a chance that unexpected something might be good. With the criminal it was a guaranteed we were all gonna lose, and lose big.
You're the one who's not getting it. Trump's support has stayed pretty constant. Through the primaries, hammered in the media and the Republican establishment non-stop, now in office and hammered by the media and all of the establishment non-stop, they have remained. They're not going to abandon him on the say-so of the media or establishment. If they perceive that he's being railroaded by the media and Establishment, they will explode.
The Republicans and Democrats in Congress are on the same side and have the votes to impeach Trump easily. They can align whatever "facts" they want to make their case for doing that, but Trump's supporters will not accept any of it. That's what the media and Establishment have to contend with. They ought to know it, too. If they don't, they're stupid.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday June 20 2017, @07:13PM (3 children)
If Americans decide that system needs to change, great, but you can't throw out the results of the election conducted under that system because you don't like its outcome without paying a very much greater price than that of suffering a winner you don't like.
Absolutely correct. The crazy part is it's a lot easier to fix than most people think.
All we need is states worth 270 electoral votes to sign onto the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. [wikipedia.org] They all agree to use their votes for the popular vote winner and since they control the majority it's done.
This is much easier that resolving the issue through a partisan congress. And, you don't need to convince every state, either, just 270 total votes worth.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday June 20 2017, @07:31PM
Yes, but the Republicans didn't just wipe out the Democrats on the federal level, but also the statehouses. So a scheme to change a system that helps them stay in office is probably going to go nowhere.
All of that presupposes, of course, that there are real differences between team blue and team red.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @07:40PM (1 child)
It would be absolutely hilarious if the Popular Vote Compact were passed and then a conservative won by winning the popular vote and not the electoral college vote. Conservative voters in liberal states and liberal voters in conservative states tend not to have high turnout, so it could happen.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @09:07PM
If a conservative won the actual popular vote than I'd be happy because it is likely they would actually be a good candidate. Meaning they would be 10x better than yet another shady democrat/republican corporate puppet.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @09:52PM (2 children)
This is totally a strawman. Nobody is saying the election results should be thrown out. (Unlike a certain Birther movement, which Trump championed... but I supposed he's never had a problem with being inconsistent. "It's rigged... wait, I won? Perfectly fair.")
People are suggesting that Trump should be Impeached, due to breaking the law (see: President Clinton). This is following the system as established. A person can be loyal to the country without blind obedience to a specific person. (Or is the minority party all traitors because they don't blindly follow the majority party?)
As for vendettas and undermining the President for political point scoring, I think there is a substantial amount of evidence which suggests there should at least be a formal inquiry. I'll also note that far less money and time has been spent investigating Trump in this "largest witch hunt ever" as compared to the Benghazi inquiries done against Clinton... And I think an accusation of "international interference with the election of the President" outweighs a "mishandling of information by the Secretary of State which resulted in endangerment of ambassadors" by pretty much every possible metric.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:55PM (1 child)
Is it, though? You see, as a progressive I understand this dog whistle meant for progressives to understand. Conservatives have their dog whistles, usually connected to something racist, and progressives have their dog whistles too and this is one. When challenged, they can blink innocently and claim, "Oh but that's not what I said at all!"
What progressives think they want in pursuing Trump's impeachment, revenge, a do-over in the court of public opinion, is not what they'll get at all should they succeed. The best case scenario is they get President Pence, whom they're probably going to like far less than President Trump because he is an organized kind of evil with the backing of the Establishment whereas Trump is chaotic and ineffective on a policy level. The worst case scenario is Trump's base explodes in fury. Either one of those is a catastrophe.
It's much better for them to rope-a-dope Trump through the end of his first term, because he's such a sucker for the catnip of controversy, all the while blocking all of his policy initiatives with the help of the Republican establishment behind the scenes. Then they run somebody who is not an abject criminal like one of the Clintons and win the Whitehouse.
Of course on the larger level that strategy doesn't stay the course of self-destruction America 1.0 is on because it does not deliver the bold reform Americans must have.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @04:50PM
Or they want, you know, the truth to come out and justice to be served. Even if the truth is, "Russia really wasn't involved, and here is the innocent explanation for all this circumstantial evidence." Even if justice means President Pence and several years of a religious administration. This is a call to learn the truth, not political gamesmanship. I repeat, you don't see widespread calls for a "do-over," or "Make Hillary President, it's her turn!" That's why I called your previous statement a strawman, and I call your reply a strawman as well.
Don't intentionally misrepresent these calls for investigation and for potential impeachment based on the findings of these investigations. It's easy to say that this is "blue-camp whining and trying to rig the system" (gee, where have I heard such baseless accusations of system rigging? #winning). They aren't... nor are they saying that Russia had literally changed votes so don't play that false-flag card either.
You keep dancing around and implying that, "Russia had no involvement with the US elections... or they did but the US population doesn't need to know more about it." Is that what you are trying to say? If so, then say it. If not, then what are you trying to say?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @08:19PM
You can only legitimately count the votes taken in states that run elections the same way as EVERY OTHER MODERN COUNTRY does, with a proper ID requirement. Mexico requires ID and won't tolerate illegal aliens -- those Mexicans sure are racist, hmmm?
Take away just California, which we know is handing out bogus ID and automatically registering people, and Trump is ahead.
Not that the outcome would be different under a popular vote of course, because the candidates would've campaigned differently.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @10:45PM
Clinton wouldn't have been the candidate without the front loading of conservative states and the refusal to schedule debates early enough or often enough to let people challenge her name recognition.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:44AM
Or maybe the will of the voters outside of California. The EC is there for a reason; so the entire country doesn't turn into Illinois. Chicago just does Chicago and has a majority of the population, now the state is bankrupt.
(Score: 5, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:26PM (7 children)
So in de-legitimizing the President, they are also de-legitimizing the entire rest of DC and Wall Street and the entire national power structure.
The press isn't de-legitimizing Trump. Trump is de-legitimizing Trump.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday June 20 2017, @07:42PM (6 children)
The press think they're de-legitimizing Trump, and others think Trump is de-legitimizing Trump. The point is they're all de-legitimizing a whole lot more than that. The whole ball of wax, in fact.
It's stupid, it's short-sighted, it's very dangerous, and it's all gonna end in tears and fire.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by J053 on Tuesday June 20 2017, @08:06PM (4 children)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @11:26PM
Why are you so eager for President Pence? Are you really so anti-homo and anti-abortion that you can't wait another 7.6 years? Pence will get his turn, assuming Ivanka doesn't go for it.
(and if you don't want Ivanka, you're a sexist anti-semite)
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday June 20 2017, @11:52PM (1 child)
Oh no no no no, we did NOT come out fine. Ford pardoning Nixon was the deathblow to the integrity of the US government. From then on it was open season, all-you-can-eat at the trough. We're finally seeing the ripening of the national karma generated by that piece of rank cowardice and tribalism. Had Ford had the guts to do the right thing, it would have sent a very different message.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:04AM
Thank you. All I could imagine from "we got out from Nixon fine" was the "This is fine" meme.
We're not dead so everything must have worked out just fine!
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday June 21 2017, @11:16AM
We were a very different country then.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Tuesday June 20 2017, @11:05PM
Neither the president, nor the Supreme Court, nor Congress has had much legitimacy for a very long time. I for one am not opposed to news organizations saying that the emperor has no clothes when the emperor in fact has no clothes.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by c0lo on Tuesday June 20 2017, @08:07PM (5 children)
And you say it like it's a bad thing? After you elected that orange clown to represent you?
Let me show what the entire world outside US thinks about the "legitimacy" of POTUS: BUTT OFF TRUMP [youtube.com].
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday June 20 2017, @11:26PM (1 child)
Mmmm... troll modding.... someone "who can't handle the truth" (grin).
No, seriously guys, except our own politicians - who must play their role in international relations - the majority of non-USian population who can afford to give a fuck about Trump**, actually do exactly this: give a fuck about your president. Sometimes they can even afford to let their position and the reasons for it known - see the link; up to you if you care or not how others, from outside your skin, see you.
---
** affording to care who POTUS is = not in positions in which the next days' survival takes precedence
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:09AM
"Cheddar faced scrotum"
hehe
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday June 21 2017, @11:13AM (2 children)
Oh, no, I voted for a molotov cocktail and a molotov cocktail he is. He's doing exactly what I expected. He might be doing exactly what other voters expected, too, but I'm not them and can't speak for them. At any rate, the Establishment has totally disenfranchised the American people in terms of policy outcomes (the origin of the phrasing, "99% vs. the 1%"), so Trump is the American people burning the house down.
But it's very dangerous for the Establishment to be de-legitimizing the President the way they are. It tears down the whole fiction they've been using to bamboozle the citizenry into thinking they live in a democracy where their voice matters. All the estates and cars and trust funds they have amassed will evaporate into nothing the moment the rabble stop buying into the idea that they should continue buying into the way things are.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday June 21 2017, @05:47PM (1 child)
Word of caution: I'm quite afraid that the 1%-ers are just fine, in spite of the smoke coming from the smouldering garbage** attemptedly lit by the American people. Perhaps they are even "grateful" to you for providing the smoke, they have to pay now only for the mirrors.
Some immediately evident 1-percenters that are doing much better so far:
1. the Military Industrial Complex - checked - increased bombing campaigns and drone presence, yuuge arms deals with Saudi, increased support for Israel, etc (Raytheon stock surge [democracynow.org]. mmm?)
2. Koch brothers and the fossil fuels clan - checked (that pipe and "clean coal" dust in your eyes. EPA gutted)
3. Tax cuts? Do you think the 1%-ers will share more of their wealth with 99%-ers only because they are taxed less? His businesses will be the first to benefit.
Google for "benefiting from trump" - you will not find any reference to the 99%-ers.
For the 1%-ers Trump is, at worse a nuisance, at best something to benefit from. If you do want to "burn the house down", then I'm afraid nothing short of "forks and pitches" will suffice - the 1%-ers are too heavy to easily move from their position (and this for quite a long time [newrepublic.com]). But maybe you'll find a less painful way to clean your house than burning it down?
---
** the only garbage you manage to lit is Hillary, I'll grant you that. However, I don't think you set it afire well enough to burn it completely.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday June 21 2017, @10:18PM
The Tea Party guys tried, and the Occupy Wall Street guys tried, but neither got anybody in DC to budge. Hillary impacted the DNC and media both and they still chose one of her acolytes for the new Chairman of the party. Trump succeeded despite the entirety of the RNC going all out to stop him, and they still haven't changed their behavior or gotten the message. At this point burning will be the least painful thing coming to them.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by BK on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:25PM (1 child)
There was a period of time -- from maybe 1950 to maybe 1990 -- when the news providers prided themselves on separating and clearly marking facts and opinions and on featuring the facts or fact based bits as the news. It was never perfect but we have the opposite now. The opinions are mixed with the facts and the major outlets generally lead with the opinion pieces.
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:47AM
Back when TV was the hallmark of civilization, we could all make the world a better place, etc.
Same thing with the Net, but it was so quickly coopted by profit seeking idiots (they got their training with TV) that we never got to the decades of awesomeness. We had the 90s which was an awkward transition from nerd hobby, truth bearer for a few years, then into cesspool where the little lotus flowers were blocked by huge cheeto dusted Turds.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @02:52PM (1 child)
Handy Guide
fact : a statement I agree with
opinion : a statement I disagree with
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:48PM
Conservative Psych 101
(Score: 2, Informative) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 20 2017, @02:55PM (17 children)
Wow, look at this complete moron who thinks that's not exactly what factual reporting and news gathering does by its nature with a reality-separated idiot as president.
(Score: 1, Troll) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:30PM
Man, who woulda guessed that people who hate objective fact mod me down for calling a moron exactly what he is.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:20PM (15 children)
What the hell are they supposed to do?
At no point in the history of the Republic have we had a President who was willing to just blatantly lie to the public like this.
The press would be derelict in their duties if they didn't point that out.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:58PM (5 children)
I don't know what level of insanity conservative types are at now, but the simple fact is that they excuse everything Trump does as "just words" or "just campaigning" or "just tweets" as if nothing he says matters. It is such a huge mental blind spot that there is simply no excusing any Trump supporter anymore. They are disingenuous and/or mentally unstable if they can't integrate the blatant lies into their worldview.
It is probably the greatest propaganda coup of all time, I bet Trump was having a great time selling obviously contradictory bullshit and having his fanbase just eat it all up. Thankfully most of the country is sane, with a good deal of Trump supporters bailing on him now that they have actionable proof that he is full of shit.
So, how about the rest of you? Where is your Trumpgret? Gonna double down on bullshit? Can you at least acknowledge the problems while saying "but I like that he is doing this and that."
I'll stop before answering the question with my own preconceptions.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @11:47PM (4 children)
The only thing that sucks is the net neutrality issue... but I knew that when I voted for Trump.
Everything else is wonderful. Trump is at minimum the greatest president since Reagan. It's possible he's the greatest since Washington. Trump is unashamedly putting the USA first. This is a basic job requirement that many recent presidents have failed to meet. Given that requirement, you can look back at all the people in all the presidential primaries and see that only Trump was really qualified.
I guess I could also ask that Trump be more Trump-like, kind of like Trump squared or something. He's being too liberal and politically correct for my taste. We need to bulldoze mosques, install a minefield next to Mexico, file felony charges against people who fail to report illegal aliens, tariff the fuck out of China, and require refugees to be in chain gangs as a condition of refugee status.
We should adjust our constitution, making a special exception so that Trump can serve longer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @12:34AM (3 children)
Newsletter: subscribed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:12AM (2 children)
You got trolllllled son!
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:29AM (1 child)
No, actually not.
I resisted the urge to say that we should pass an enabling act. My reason to resist is a mix of "it doesn't seem right" and "don't want to look like a troll". Nevertheless, I do find it tempting.
Trump isn't perfect. He's only 95% good. He is pretty much saving America, or at least suspending a perhaps-inevitable decline, so I'll gladly tolerate the small issues.
If you don't love America, uh, maybe you should leave. You could go to some place you prefer. Maybe one of: Germany, Sweden, Venezuela, Cuba, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Ireland, Mexico... There are lots of choices. You can have communism, Islam, non-white people, and all that other unamerican stuff you like.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:50AM
Lol look at the douche trying to piggy back on my trolling. The conservative screwballs just can't face their own mistakes ;)
(Score: 2, Redundant) by jmorris on Tuesday June 20 2017, @06:53PM (6 children)
You mean other than Obama's "You can keep your doctor" and "not a smidgen of corruption" and a thousand other whoppers? Or Bush II? Or Bubba Clinton, who was PRAISED by Democratic Senator Bob Kerrey with "Bill Clinton's an unusually good liar. Unusually good." Or Bush I and his lying lips? And so forth back to before any of us here were born?
(Score: 3, Touché) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday June 20 2017, @07:06PM (3 children)
So in 8 years of Obama the best you can come up with is "you can keep your doctor" when 99% of people did in fact keep their doctor?
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:11AM (2 children)
Actually, I used that one because I thought it was the least controversial, EVERYONE agrees it was a lie. It won Politifact's Lie of the Year [cbsnews.com] and all. Of course that admission came years too late to matter and had no admission that we who saw it for a lie when it was uttered were correct all along. And no admission the lying weasels who told us we were racists for saying Obama was lying, themselves also knew it was a lie. And of course the admission was past the reelection campaign so Obama wouldn't have to pay any price for the media finally admitting something as obvious as water being wet.
Except apparently there are still a few rabid fanboys who can never admit Obama is a lying shit who hates America and spent eight years trying to remake us into something worthy of his admiration. And so here you are. Screw you. And screw Politifact.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @02:03AM (1 child)
Well your compadres did post lots of FB pics showing the pres hanging from a tree, so you'll just have to give up on the "they called us racist" whining.
Also, Obama was obstructed 100% by the Republicans on everything so it is actually your preferred party's fault more than anything.
That said, Obama was a lying monster who advanced tyranny while pretending to help the people. Fuck that guy and his jokes about droning his daughter's BF. Fascist piece of crap.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @03:25AM
Yet, strangely enough, even when the Democrats had a supermajority, they still couldn't get anything done. Republican obstructionism doesn't explain everything; it's almost as if Democratic politicians don't want to do what they say they want to do. It's obvious that Republican politician are scumbags, so just being better than them isn't good enough.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @09:12PM (1 child)
There is a huge difference between broken campaign promises and factual lies. Of course they all lie, every human does to some degree. Trying to equate Trump with any other president is just another sign of your mental problems.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @03:28AM
Politicians are just humans who lie far, far more (and about larger issues) than the vast majority of other humans.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @08:19PM
> At no point in the history of the Republic have we had a President who was willing to just blatantly lie to the public like this.
Recent example: 2009-2017
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Tuesday June 20 2017, @11:14PM
Sure we have. I'll focus on presidents who've been dead for a while to reduce controversy a bit, but here are some presidential liars:
- Woodrow Wilson: Got re-elected campaigning on keeping the US out of World War I, and then promptly got us into it shortly after his re-election.
- Abraham Lincoln: Regularly told different crowds different things depending on who his audience was. In particular, he regularly fibbed about his positions regarding slavery and black people in general.
- Franklin Roosevelt: Hid his polio-related disabilities throughout his presidency.
- Richard Nixon: "I am not a crook". Enough said.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:57PM
You're right!
A sitting president under investigation for collusion with a hostile foreign government to subvert the democratic process is so totally un-newsworthy. They should report more about Clinton's email, obviously!
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:15PM (1 child)
Hahahha, I was all on board right up till the end. Defending Trump is like being a flat earther. It ensures people think you are dumb and taints anything it touches.
Trump is the biggest liar, gossip, and hypocritical shit talker. He deserves every bit of mud slinging he gets.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Joe Desertrat on Wednesday June 21 2017, @08:54AM
The President in particular is very much a figurehead — he wields no real power whatsoever. He is apparently chosen by the government, but the qualities he is required to display are not those of leadership but those of finely judged outrage. For this reason the President is always a controversial choice, always an infuriating but fascinating character. His job is not to wield power but to draw attention away from it. On those criteria
Zaphod BeeblebroxTrump is one of the most successful Presidents theGalaxyU.S.A. has ever had...(Score: 5, Insightful) by mth on Tuesday June 20 2017, @02:42PM (40 children)
Pandering to both major parties equally is not objectivity.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:04PM (17 children)
It is however, exactly what one "side" needs to survive now that their ideology has become obsessively reality-averse, essentially trying to make confirmation bias into their official political position.
They need some former politician to come out and say "Americans love the freedom of not having reliable healthcare" for balance after presentation of the basic fact that non-partisan analysis of the AHCA suggests 25-35 million people will lose coverage if it's passed. It's not actually true in any objective sense, but saying it "for balance", muddles any serious debate and analysis of the actual problem.
The republicans absolutely need their ideology presented as equal importance to every single piece of objective fact in order to persist in their current form. Trump is the apotheosis of that cultural trend, already.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:33PM (1 child)
True reporting would then do the responsible thing and critique the statements. However they won't do that, or if they do it will be with a panel of "experts" who just yell at each other and make things even more confusing.
Sadly there is too much money in propaganda and I don't see a real way forward to get any reliable objectivity. There are plenty of fact checking websites out there, but who can you trust? It is sometimes just a simple matter of phrasing to turn something around, or cast enough doubt on "facts" that people select what feeeeels right.
g'damnit!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @07:14PM
Ya know, you could do some of your own research once in a while. It hasn't (yet) been outlawed by the Republicans. Go ahead and try it some time.
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:37PM (7 children)
Taking just that sentence alone I couldn't tell which political party you were talking about. I'm pretty sure it's true of both.
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:57PM (6 children)
I acknowledge there's a core validity to your point, but also come the fuck on with that shit.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @06:46PM (5 children)
Isn't it fun how conservatives have turned the "tolerance and respect" that liberals value against us? SO FUN!
Just another tool in their mud slinging projection kit.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 20 2017, @08:41PM (4 children)
Uh, no. You got confused.
That's the "Both sides are bad" bullshit, not the "tolerate the implementation of terrible, evil policy in the same way you say we should tolerate the mere existence of people who are different" bullshit.
I know it's hard to keep straight all the things you know they don't actually believe but say anyways because they're intellectually dishonest assholes. There's so many.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @02:06AM
I wasn't confused, and I wasn't thinking jdavidb was making that conservative play. It was more a tangential comment more than anything, but I can see how it messed with the thread of conversation.
Conservatives are really trying hard to validate their current worldview, my only hope is that a few years of this horrifying outburst of pent up rage will cause the more moderate conservatives to reevaluate their positions.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @03:31AM (1 child)
To suggest that that is bullshit is pure lunacy. It's obvious that both parties are evil, though I think they are evil to different extents. Just saying "Both X and Y are bad." is not the same as saying "X and Y are equally bad." Unless someone says the latter, false equivalency does not apply. At most, you should ask for further clarification.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Wednesday June 21 2017, @09:24PM
Nope, sorry. It's bullshit. If you believe it, you're a bullshit believer.
Centrists have their admirable qualities: peacemaking, intolerance of the shit-slinging nature of modern politics, and statistically speaking, marginally more intelligence than partisans.
Dishonest bullshit detection doesn't seem to be among those qualities, though. Both sides are filled with flawed human beings and ideologies that override sense. One "side", however, has been so consistently leading the charge on making things worse, both in terms of how politics operate, and disregard for ethics in pursuit of ideology, that to say the phrase "Both sides are bad" is almost innately dishonest.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday June 21 2017, @02:15PM
Hmm. I say both sides serve the same master, and as such are not really "sides" at all, at least, not against each other. I base my assertion on policy outcomes. Real incomes for Americans have been on an uninterrupted 40 year slide. The average CEO makes thousands of times more than the media worker now, as opposed to 7 times more 40 years ago. We went from the Church Commission to total police state surveillance in the same period. All these things have proceeded through multiple changes of administration and congressional majorities from Republican to Democrat and back again. If those two parties were in fact "sides," and different, then the trajectory of those real outcomes would have shifted.
Or perhaps you live in a parallel universe where everything is in fact awesome and you're communicating with us, unwittingly, via a short circuit in the dimensional membrane of existence.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:41PM
Oooh! Ooh! This looks like a fun game! Can I play too? Mister Rogers said I can play too!
They need to have someone come out and say that the PPACA is the last, best hope for coverage of millions of americans after presentation of the basic fact that it's not the only approach to providing health care, even absent single payer options, and that the purportedly market-oriented elements of the PPACA aren't actually motivating insurers to offer money-losing policies. It's not actually true in any objective sense, but saying it "for balance", muddles any serious debate and analysis of the actual problem.
The democrats absolutely need their ideology presented as equal importance to every single piece of objective fact in order to persist in their current form. The DNC is the apotheosis of that cultural trend, already.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Tuesday June 20 2017, @06:58PM (5 children)
They need some former politician to come out and say "Americans love the freedom of not having reliable healthcare" for balance after presentation of the basic fact that non-partisan analysis of the AHCA suggests 25-35 million people will lose coverage if it's passed. It's not actually true in any objective sense
I'm sorry, but you're completely wrong. It IS true in an objective sense. There really *are* a lot of Americans who do really do *want* 25-35 million (or more, they don't care) people to lose coverage. There are a *lot* of Americans who don't want other Americans to get something "for free", or at any kind of "subsidized" price. In short, there are a lot of Americans who would be very happy if people who couldn't afford healthcare had to go without. They would be happy if someone who doesn't have thousands of dollars to pay for an ER visit were just kicked outside on the curb and allowed to die. We saw this back in '08 I believe at one of the Republican debates: people were cheering the idea of letting people die on the curb while Ron Paul was answering a question about this.
Remember, America is fundamentally a culture that revolves around "I got mine, so fuck you!". Obviously, not all Americans are like this, but many of the Trump voters are. The entire conservative side is like this to some extent; they don't want people getting stuff for "free" because they hate other groups of Americans. For some, it's rich vs. poor: the people with money don't want to pay any taxes to help those who don't, and would prefer that they died. For many (most?) others, it's racism: they don't want "their" money going to help minorities. For some, it's religion: they don't want "their" money helping people who aren't Christian.
Continuing to ignore this truth about conservatives is muddling serious debate and analysis of the actual problem.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @11:58PM (3 children)
People will "vote against their own interests" when they are conservative. This is always a mystery to the left. I'll explain it.
We have different definitions of "fair". Liberals go with "we all get the same stuff". Conservatives go with "we get what is ours, what we have earned, or what we deserve". Everybody wants things to be fair, but we disagree on the definition of "fair".
Non-psychopaths feel bad about themselves when they know they are being unfair. This is why many of us don't steal things, even when we won't get caught. When a conservative receives help from the government, it feels wrong. It is like theft.
Conservatives might accept help that is offered, especially if their family is in need, but it still feels awful to be receiving a freebie. It's almost like being a thief. People have more needs than just the material needs. People want to feel that they are righteous, just, fair, honest, and all that. Few people wish to be a bad person.
So it isn't just "I got mine, so fuck you!". It's also "I didn't earn this; it isn't right."
(Score: 1, Troll) by Grishnakh on Wednesday June 21 2017, @04:32AM (2 children)
So you think people who can't afford an emergency surgery should just die on the curb, because they haven't "earned" that. Thanks for clearing up how much of a psychopath and a wretched excuse for a human being you are. If you're ever down on your luck financially and need medical care, please be sure to stay at home and die since you obviously don't deserve any treatment.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @05:47AM (1 child)
Nice strawman you got there. What is with salty leftist and strawmen?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @03:38PM
It is not a strawman, it is objective truth. It is too bad conservatives are stuck in their blind ideology and can't comprehend anything more complicated then "I shine your shoes and you give me 2 bits!". Seriously, the double think is really bad. We have socialized a lot of things with government and taxes, and only deluded people argue for zero gov / taxes. I guess conservatives just have a hard time thinking outside their immediate bubble of awareness.
So while I understand the moral argument of not getting handouts, it doesn't work for the larger picture and is simply naive. Grow up conservatives, your ideology is strangling the country.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Wednesday June 21 2017, @02:35AM
The only problem is, the great DNC 'leader' Hillary said "fuck you, Bernie... I got mine" when she and DWS stole his campaigning funds and support.
She had no problem fucking her own 'partner' in the DNC.
She stole from him, all in the name of winning.
"Obviously, not all Americans are like this, but many of the Trump voters are."
Obviously, this also includes Hillary Rodham Clinton!
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:09PM (20 children)
Yet, its far more objective than the existing system where roughly 100% of journalism professors are registered democrats, roughly 100% of journalism grads are democrats, roughly 100% of TV news readers are registered democrats, etc. Asking when CNN will present balanced news is literally like asking the Democratic National Committee when it will present balanced press releases, because its basically the same people in cooperation.
Which brings up the somewhat serious practical problem of if for decades the establishment has only permitted establishment single party politics in an economic field, you can't just wave a magic wand and staff up 50:50. There are basically no Republican journalists, rounded down as a statistical anomaly. You can't staff up a department if there are literally no people.
The answer seems to be immigration. We can replace our expensive lefty journalists with migrant journalists and H1B journalists, obtaining a better more balanced profit while also reducing expenses.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:35PM (9 children)
Are you saying that Fox News, the Wall Street Journal, the Economist, and the National Review are actually staffed 100% by democrats? That's so devious.
How have they fooled millions of conservatives for so long?
What's a genuine source of conservative news, StormFront?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:59PM
My folks were fans of Mark Koernke [wikipedia.org]. Maybe Liberty Tree Radio [4mg.com] is conservative news?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Tuesday June 20 2017, @06:27PM (4 children)
It's not that hard, they are not too bright.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday June 20 2017, @07:37PM (3 children)
That then begs the question, if it is the case that all journalists and reporters and editors are Democrats and the ones working for Fox, the Wall Street Journal, etc. were only pretending to push a conservative narrative, then why were they doing that? If in fact they're all on the same Democratic team, why would they work at cross purposes by pushing a "liberal" narrative at MSNBC while pushing a "conservative" narrative at Fox? Unless...team red vs. team blue is not their agenda at all but something else, right?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by aristarchus on Tuesday June 20 2017, @08:14PM (2 children)
First, Phoenix, never use "begs the question" for "raises the question", or you will get curmudgeons like myself falling all over their selves to straighten you out.
Why? What better way to get rid of the so-called conservative movement in America than to let them win? We might call it the "Kansas strategy". But I prefer to think of it along the lines of what the American economist, Thorstein Veblen, said was the Chinese approach to national defense. Veblen was proposing a similar approach to the Kaiser in WWI, "Let the Germans win." No better way to destroy imperial ambition than to allow, or even abet, its success!
China, being the Central Kingdom 中国 , had to deal with all sorts of barbarians that would raid its borders and generally cause mischief. But much like with the "Ethics of Parasites", if you want to be a raider, it is in your best interest not to threaten the health, and certainly not the existence of your host. Thus China would often buy off barbarians, or co-opt them into being frontier guards against other barbarians.
Of course, the reason this worked was that if a nation of barbarians were to conquer China, they would lose. And certainly this did happen once, with the Yuan dynasty and Kublai Khan, the grandson of Ghengis. But the thing is, once you conquer China, and make yourself the emperor, you really can't be a Mongol anymore. No more hunting on the steppes, there are affairs of state to tend to. And you cannot be emperor of China if you do not both speak and write Chinese! And the Emperor must dress appropriately for mandatory ritual. So the Mongols took over China. But what happened to them? Within two generations, they were just Chinese.
.
So we let the Republicans win. In fact, even force them to elect Trumpf the Khan, a real estate pillager from the North! And then we let them try to govern. Now they actually can repeal and replace Obamacare, and in fact they will have to. But it will destroy them. In the future, only old people will say, "Read my lips, no new taxes." Then we will know they are the ones who used to be Republican.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @04:56PM (1 child)
once you have paid him the Danegeld/ You never get rid of the Dane [wikipedia.org]
Power begets power, especially in politics. It shifts cultural norms, and allows entrenchment. Why do you think there are only 2 major political parties, despite so many people begging for a 3rd or 4th choice?
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Wednesday June 21 2017, @06:02PM
Um, because in China, there is only one party? And no Danes, except Matt Damon, and I am pretty sure that was fiction.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @08:25PM (2 children)
There has long been an internal battle at Fox over the message.
Fox is in New York. They hire journalists. Nearly all of them are liberal.
Fox leadership, until just recently (due to death), was conservative. Leadership sort of runs the show of course, but underlings subvert the desired message. Fox was slightly conservative as a result.
The new leadership at Fox is at best uninterested in fighting that fight. We now see Fox rapidly moving left.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:53AM (1 child)
So instead of Hitler we'll get Carter. I'm OK with this.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Wednesday June 21 2017, @02:44AM
Me too!
https://www.planetclaire.tv/quotes/stargate-sg1/samantha-carter/season-two/ [planetclaire.tv]
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:40PM (1 child)
We can replace our expensive lefty journalists with migrant journalists and H1B journalists
Well, we did have Connie Chung...
But seriously, the only person that ever spoke factually on the TV was Julia Child
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:06PM
Even she believed in the seared meat heresy and a couple other oddities.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:12PM
Ah, but that's because reality has a well-known liberal bias. I think you can chill, dude.
(Score: 2) by NewNic on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:17PM
Perhaps that's because parroting talking points of the Koch Brothers and their think tanks doesn't require any skills?
Perhaps it is because people that are interested in reporting facts tend to be Democrats?
What your statistic shows is not bias in the media, but the bankruptcy and corruption of views on the right.
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 3, Funny) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:21PM
Look, asshole, it's not the Democrats' fault most of you 'cons can't read past the third grade. You're self-selecting out of the job market for journalism.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:23PM (4 children)
You are so fucking CRAZY VLM. I really REALLY wish we could have a SoylentNation Meetup just so we can find out who everyone actually is.
From the various times I've actually seen some TV news the "experts" are 99.9% of the time supportive of whatever bias the channel is pushing. There are conservative, liberal, and anarcho/libertarian types all the time! Fox news is almost 100% conservative, along with a bunch of other outlets.
"Roughly 100% of" lololol, come ON. Given the last sentence I actually wonder if you're just trolling, but you say crazy shit so often it is impossible to say.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday June 20 2017, @08:44PM (1 child)
We do every day, right here!
I say crazy shit but usually because its true. I'm not so much crazy, as really really good at finding the craziest shit. I've been a human google-bot for half a century. Some people don't think it thru and think that I can find crazy facts means I'm crazy; not so, its all the worlds fault. I couldn't cut and paste this much craziness without a hell of a lot of help from the world. I'm actually boring as hell rational when I'm talking hard engineering, probably because your average transistor engineering datasheet isn't as batshit crazy as, say, the world, or politics, or journalism, or religion, etc.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2014/05/06/just-7-percent-of-journalists-are-republicans-thats-far-less-than-even-a-decade-ago/ [washingtonpost.com]
OK I call "about zero" what in 2013 was 7%. Of course if you extend trend plots and cut about 1% annually then 2017 would be about 3% predicted.
I'm not even going to listen to outrage posts that I dare call 3% "about zero". Spare me.
http://www.mrc.org/special-reports/liberal-mediaevery-poll-shows-journalists-are-more-liberal-american-public-%E2%80%94-and [mrc.org]
(admittedly maybe not the most unbiased source)
http://www.mediaite.com/online/scathing-report-shows-just-how-many-journalists-have-contributed-to-clintons-campaign/ [mediaite.com]
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/05/report-journalists-are-miserable-over-educated-under-paid-middle-aged-men-mostly/361891/ [theatlantic.com]
No copy and paste, darn near the entire article. The change over time is amazing.
I will admit this is pretty much a grumpy old man issue. People today accept that journalists are staggeringly overwhelmingly left wing. But when I was a kid (a long time ago) it was actually kinda balanced. I suspect some of the people who disagreed with me without having done any research of their own, are also "older" and relying on life experiences in the 80s or something. Even as late as 1980 you were only twice as likely to find a "D" than a "R" unlike now where its nearly impossible to find an "R" journalist other than specialty venues (like fox news or the economist or whatever).
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @11:01PM
Thanks for actual links, as usual your reporting of "the truth" is quite skewed as to sound very crazy. Stop with the crazy huh? Then you won't get so many "expressions of love".
So, the truth: Republicans lost a lot of journalists over time, Democrats lost a good chunk, while independents and other rose sharply. To me this doesn't scream "all journalists are liberals" it simply shows that party affiliation has rapidly dropped. I am NOT shocked to see that republicans fell faster than democrats, because the GOP is a cesspool of snakes and liars. The democrats still pretend occasionally to take the high road.
So, you're narrative is false and doesn't even mention the sizable drop in Democrat journalists. #FAKENEWS #SAD #OLDMANWALKING
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday June 21 2017, @02:29PM (1 child)
Oh that's easy. VLM would be the one with the toothbrush moustache. Then jmorris would show up with one, too, and they'd joyfully, reflexively salute each other with an 'ave' before self-consciously checking the gesture and morphing it into a motion to slick back their hair. Aristarchus and takyon would generally resemble Radagast the Brown, and azuma and kurenai would be dressed all in rainbows cross-cut with aggressive punk touches like spiked collars. Buzzard would show up in a fishing vest. I would be the one in the corner, snarling at everyone.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday June 22 2017, @03:49AM
I'd actually be wearing what I normally wear, which is black jeans, a black top, steel-toed boots, and some lacy black things under it. Black looks good on me. Trust me, at six feet and with almost knee-length hair I don't need to dress weird to stand out.
I'm almost painfully shy in meatspace. No one would guess I was gay looking at me either. I don't wear pride buttons or anything. Mostly I just want to be left the hell alone, so might not even show up to said meetup. That said, you *might* see me with a handful of Uzzard's teeth and some fragments of that fishing vest of his if he gets uppity.
Ever watch a weird little anime called Azumanga Daiou? Think "early-30s Sakaki, but with a way less privileged upbringing and a grudge against the world."
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Tuesday June 20 2017, @11:21PM
Particularly when, as is not totally infrequently the case, both major parties are wrong. This idea that there are exactly 2 sides to an issue, and that the Republicans necessarily represent one side while the Democrats necessarily represent the other side, is complete nonsense.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.